


(we will be together) if the fates allow.

by vicbartons



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Christmas, M/M, surprise meetings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-09-24 04:58:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17094356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vicbartons/pseuds/vicbartons
Summary: Sometimes, a desperate trip to a coffee shop in an even more desperate attempt to avoid the place you are supposed to be can lead you exactly where you need to be.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [raelee514](https://archiveofourown.org/users/raelee514/gifts).



> title from "have yourself a marry little christmas"

“Careful with that one,” Ellis muttered as he squeezed through the door next to him and struggled to untie the knot in the back of his apron in a hurry to finally get home for the holidays. “Proper Christmas Grinch,” he clarified, giving a subtle-not-so-subtle nod towards a bloke sitting on the corner table at the window with his back towards them, head buried deep in his laptop and an extra large cup of coffee on hand.

“Probably, cause you‘re so charming, eh?” Aaron smirked at him before pulling his dark woolen bobble hat off. It was dripping now that the warmth of the coffee shop had started to work against the dozens of snowflakes that Aaron had brought in with him and he couldn‘t help himself but try and shake some of the drops of water out right against the younger man‘s face.

Ellis‘ corresponding eye-roll earned him a well-meant slap to the back.

Grumpy facade aside, Aaron was the kind of boss who‘d fight a war for his employees, if need be. Especially when faced with some snotty baby boomer who liked to get offended by having to wait in a line for a full three minutes when coming into the shop right at the “last chance to get caffeine before university starts” rush hour of eight forty-five, or some hipster-y part-time-vegan philosophy student who enjoyed sending back half-eaten cookies five times over for tasting too sweet or too artificial in the hopes of bagging himself a free meal. But that aside, they both knew that - a lot like Aaron himself - Ellis tended to have quite the mouth on him when someone rubbed him the wrong way.

Even more so when he was working the much hated Christmas Eve shift.

Once Ellis had disappeared to his locker to pack it in for the day, Aaron grabbed his own apron and pulled it over his head, giving the machines and the bakery display a quick once-over before taking his place at the counter to face the last few hours of the Christmas shift.

He never much minded it to be honest. Being his own boss had been Aaron‘s dream ever since he had had to earn his first few pennies as a mechanic under Cain‘s hard-nosed look. All his dodgy ways aside, his uncle had always taken his business incredibly serious and while Aaron had respected that and had found it something to look up to, 16-year-old him would have respected getting to decide on his own lunch hours and ending up with more than a tenner in his pocket after spending a full eight hours under a bonnet in the burning August heat even more.

And this shop had been his chance at all of that and more. So when the opportunity had come up a little over a year ago, with one of their old customers declaring over a broken shock mount that he was about to move to Germany to make a go of it with his bird and leave his old shop behind without a new owner in sight, Aaron‘s ears had perked up.

Yes, he had only been 25 and yes he hadn‘t know a thing about running a business, but he had loved tea ever since he could remember - a good cuppa sometimes the only bright spot in his day back when those had consisted of nothing but screaming matches and trouble - and he barely went a day without coffee since an ex-boyfriend of his had dragged him to France for a couple of months, his relationship with the caffeinated liquid the only one that had made it back up north without ending up in tatters.

So he had scoured his savings account and any sock in sight for every last penny of his savings. And when that hadn‘t been enough, he had swallowed most of his pride and gotten himself a half-decent loan with the help of his family. Because say what you like about the Dingles, but for what often seemed like a mismatched bunch of thugs and simpletons from the outside, they had always been exceptionally good at coming together to support their own. And they could be incredibly resourceful when need be as well. (Though to this day Aaron would rather not know where Cain and Charity had dug up their respective shares.)

Which was how he had ended up here now.

With a shop of his own, working on Christmas Eve of all days and enjoying every minute of it in a way he never thought he would, the constant grinding of the machines behind him and the bitter smell of caffeine in the air calming his usually so busy mind in a way he‘d never expected it to, but treasured all the more for it. Keeping his shop open for most of the Christmas holiday, even if not as long as usual, had been one of Aaron‘s best ideas to date. Those days always earning him a few new customers; searching souls who had been let down by all the usual chains and ended up stumbling into the little corner shop in desperate need of a cuppa or maybe just a bit of peace and quiet.

Aaron could relate.

Especially to the latter one, when he himself still had a classic Christmas Dingle do ahead of him later in the evening.

It was why he always liked to send the boys home earlier than usual on Christmas Eve and end the shift all by himself. His place behind the counter had somehow become Aaron‘s own little oasis of calm, carved out for himself amidst the holiday rush.

“Seriously, mate,“ Matty chimed in in a whisper from his place at the till after having overheard the exchange between Aaron and Ellis, dragging his boss from his daydream with it. “He‘s been sitting there since half nine this morning, complaining about everything like a right muppet and with a face like someone‘s just run over his favourite cat and his grandma in one go.” It came out as an annoyed sigh. 

There was a quick pause before he added, “could give yours a run for its money, I reckon.”

Aaron furrowed his brows at him and turned to take a closer look at the bloke.

He didn‘t seem like your typical troublemaker, but the light brown elbow patches adorning his dark blue blazer and the thick, black coat hanging over the back of his chair that looked like it might have cost more than Aaron made in a month gave him just enough of an air of poshness to make him the type to complain about his cappuccino only being topped by one instead of the recommended 1.5 inches of foam. And yet there was also something familiar and warm about the man and the way he kept running his hand through his wild blond hair in frustration, strands sticking up in every direction at the back of his head.

Not enough though to make Aaron dismiss Matty‘s judgement out of hand.

Unlike for Ellis, this wasn‘t Matty‘s first stint as a barista. He had survived two years at the local Starbucks before Aaron had taken him on, meaning that he had spent two entire years of his life selling completely overpriced muck to every customer imaginable and somehow keeping a straight face when asked for such atrocities as Unicorn Frappuccinos with almond milk, 6 shots and no whip.

So there usually was absolutely nothing a customer could do to truly put Matty off.

(It was also the reason Aaron had earned himself a massive, unwanted hug from him when he‘d explained that his plan was to just sell coffee and tea, the menu not carrying a single beverage with more than five syllables in its name, nor anything pumpkin spice or snickerdoodle flavoured, thank you very much.)

Which meant that if Matty called someone difficult, they had to be an absolute nightmare.

 

\---

 

Robert‘s phone started to vibrate yet again with the fifth video call request from Victoria in as many hours. Before that it had just been a slew of text messages, but his little sister had always been incredibly determined when need be so the chances of her giving up any time soon were minimal to say the least.

Robert had tried.

He really had.

Because it was Christmas and he loved his sister. But also because, as much as he didn‘t ever want to admit it out loud, the loneliness of the bachelor life he had suddenly found himself  forced into was starting to eat away at him.

So he had ordered a ridiculous amount of presents for Vic and Diane off Amazon and let them eat away at his savings in an attempt to make up for lost time. Had folded his nicest shirts neatly and ironed all his pants before putting them into his travel bag. He had showered and shaved and put some effort into his hair instead of just letting it greasily stick to his forehead for what was probably the first time in the month since he had had to ditch the slightly upscale room in a B&B he had called home for so long in favour of a tiny one-bedroom apartment for lack of funds. (Because in all the time he had stayed there, he couldn‘t even be bothered about the pizza delivery guy realising what a mess of a human he really was by the state of him. Not that the four orders a week hadn‘t already been a dead giveaway anyway.)

And then he had stuffed everything into his car to drive. The fact alone that he had gotten into the front seat with a direction in mind, instead of yet again only having an aimless drive with the only purpose of making the night go by a little faster ahead of him  enough to put a smile on his face.

So he had turned up some Top100 station on the radio and sung along to Cher and Chris Rae in full force. And then he‘d driven out of Leeds and onto the highway and as the sky had gotten darker around him and snowflakes had started to dribble onto his windshield until he could barely see the street ahead of him anymore, Chris Rae had started to sing about all the memories he was driving home for Christmas with just one time too many for Robert not to remember that in actuality he would far prefer to drive as far away from all those memories as his Porsche would carry him, rather than to let them hit him again with full force. 

So he had left the highway at the next exit and stopped at the first Motel he could find.

In Hotten.

Not Emmerdale.

Because deep down underneath all the charm and his own illusion of grandeur, Robert had always been a coward at heart and Hotten‘s town sign had been as far as he could manage to drive before it had felt as though his stomach was about to turn with the images that were burning in his mind: Old ones of his dad screaming at him with a red face and wide eyes, of belts with silver metal buckles and burning barns.

But also new ones.

Scenarios that hadn‘t played out in front of him yet, but that his mind enjoyed to torture him with anyway as if they were absolutely certainties.

Unavoidable horrors yet to come.

Like the disappointment Robert was bound to find in Diane‘s eyes the moment he would take a step through her door or the footless guilt that Victoria would try to hide behind bitten lips and red cheeks for not having been a shoulder to lean on in the year gone by. As if Robert would have let her anyway.

His phone beeped again and he turned it on its screen just so he wouldn‘t have to stare at Vic‘s smiling face looking up at him from it anymore.

God, he needed another coffee.

 

\---

 

It took almost an hour before Aaron got to really meet the man that Matty and Ellis had been so happy to throw their “asshole of the month” award at after only having spent a mere six hours in his presence.

Gnawing on his ballpoint pen, Aaron had made himself comfortable at the table closest to the sales counter with the books spread out in front of him. It was almost four now and the shop was even quieter than it had been even an hour ago: A young couple completely oblivious to the world around them with their ankles wrapped around each other under the table and their noses almost buried in their respective hot chocolates and the apparent Christmas Grinch who hadn‘t moved from his place in the corner his only customers.

It had been the perfect opportunity for Aaron to try and get a handle on his budget for the new year.

Or so he had thought.

He had only gotten lost in fees and transactions for a minute or two - the year of running his own place not enough to have stopped numbers and calculations from giving him a right headache just like they had back in school - when the blond started to bellow, his voice carrying through the room and almost making Aaron jump.

“Can anyone around here be bothered to actually work and serve a half decent cup of coffee, for fuck‘s sake?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Aaron could see him standing at the opposite side of the counter now. One hand grabbing its top tightly as he leaned over and tried to peer into the backroom in hopes of finding someone to yell at, the other waving his empty coffee cup. Seemingly, he hadn‘t noticed Aaron hunched over at his table yet, though that wasn‘t all that surprising with all the Christmas decorations that Matty and Ellis had outvoted him on as well as the till obscuring the view.

“Just a minute, mate.”

Aaron had been doing this for long enough now to know in which moments to pull his best fake-happy customer service voice out of his bag of tricks and this was just one of those.

Calmly, he pushed his chair back and got up, dropping the pen onto the table without a care as he took a deep breath and plastered an overly kind smile onto his face before he turned to serve the his new least favourite customer.

The corners of his mouth dropped as quickly as he‘d pulled them upwards as his eyes were met with green-blue ones, high cheekbones and a nose scattered with freckles that he couldn‘t make out with the distance that the counter was putting between the two of them, but could have drawn a map of in his sleep anyway for having spent so many restless nights in hotel rooms softly tracing them with his ring finger in a desperate attempt to commit every inch of the man to memory.

“Robert.”

It wasn‘t a question, just a whisper thrown into the space between them, low and unbelieving.

“Aaron.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> part 2 incoming once i‘m back home with my laptop and a working internet connection!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my wifi has me back and it‘s not the new year just yet, so have some more slightly christmas related fic.

Aaron looked different now.

His dark brown hair was free from gel and instead falling in soft, natural curls - the ones that Robert had always loved to run his fingers through as Aaron was snoring away on his chest, dead to the world - he had grown his beard out a little too, dark edges making his jaw line even more pronounced, and his chest looked somehow wider, shoulders and biceps stretching the material of his soft grey sweater in just the right way. He looked more comfortable than Robert had ever seen him, like he‘d grown into himself in the two years since they‘d seen each other last.

But at the same time he was exactly the same. Every inch the man Robert had fallen so hard for that it had thrown his entire world out of kilter.

Two whole years.

Robert had had flings before Aaron. Lots of them. A revolving door of men and women he‘d dragged along to hotel rooms and secret getaways, rarely even bothering to learn their full names before he would crawl back home into his marital bed and curl into Chrissie‘s side like it hadn‘t changed a thing.

Until Aaron.

They had met on a Friday in spring at a farm machinery show in Leeds of all places. Robert had been sent there by Lawrence to represent White Industries. Because at his age, the man couldn‘t be bothered to be on his feet all day anymore, but also because he enjoyed foisting the ass-kissing off to his much disliked son-in-law. It had never been a task Robert minded, his salesman skills finely honed and infamous, but he had still found himself in need of some sort of extra curricular entertainment when spending full weekends stuck in a ten by fifteen inch booth, faux charm oozing from every pore of his body.

He hadn‘t exactly expected the Leeds convention center a peak pick-up opportunity, considering that the field was still dominated by middle-aged men in ill-fitting tweed who had long but gone soft around the middle, but with his wife at home - Chrissie always excelling at the business side of things, but never wanting to bother herself with getting her hands dirty on the actual machinery, let alone the farmers buying it - Robert hadn‘t been able to stop his eyes from wandering.

It‘s not like there hadn‘t been enough opportunities, short pencil skirts and well-cut suits roaming the floor now that most bosses had caught on to Lawrence‘s idea of outsourcing the sales side of things to their younger, more energetic staff, but Robert had found them all to be exceedingly bland.

Aaron had been different.

He had scoured the halls in a pair of slightly baggy jeans and a dark grey shirt, a black hoodie with discoloured strings and a hole in its left arm completing his get-up. There had been a permanent scowl etched onto his face as he had slid a run-of-the-mill business card over the table of Robert‘s sales booth.

“If ya ever need a mechanic to fix all those fancy tractors for ya customers, mate,” he‘d grumbled at him with a nod to the picture wall behind Robert, barely even bothering to open his mouth as he spoke.

Robert had reached over to pull the card towards himself and just for a second his hand had brushed up against Aaron‘s fingertips. When he‘d looked up, he‘d found a pair of clear blue eyes fixed to his own, pinning him down and pulling him in.

Looking back, Robert could pinpoint that exact moment as the one when his world had started to come off its axis.

Not even thirty minutes later, his booth had been abandoned in favour of a bathroom stall and Robert had found himself pressed against its door with his pants around his ankles. One hand working Aaron‘s curls free from gel, the other in his own mouth in an attempt to stifle his moans.

That alone though wouldn‘t have been too out of the blue, considering Robert‘s track record when it came to fidelity.

What had made Aaron different was that he had stuck.

Through that evening in Leeds and all the weekend getaways that followed. Through dirty nights away and cozy evenings curled on the sofa in Robert and Chrissie‘s flat when she was away on business. Through screaming matches and make-ups and that night when Aaron woke up to Robert crying, hunched against the footrest of their hotel bed on the anniversary of his mother‘s death.

Aaron had just stuck.

And it had scared Robert to the bone.

Until one morning - almost a year on from when he and Aaron had first met - buried deep inside Chrissie and with his hands running along the soft skin of her blushed cheeks, he had found himself yearning for the rough edges of Aaron‘s beard underneath his fingertips instead. So he had squeezed his eyes shut and kissed her hard, delicate lips swallowing a cry for Aaron from stumbling from his mouth.

After, Robert had disappeared into the ensuite before Chrissie had even had the chance to catch her breath and by the time he‘d cleaned himself up and thrown enough cold water on his face to stop his heart from beating out of his chest and scrub the image of Aaron‘s smile from behind his tired lids, he had convinced himself that there was only one way out of it all.

A single logical solution to the mess he’d gotten himself into.

So he had asked Aaron to meet up at this hole in the wall that served the best curry going in Leeds right by the convention center where they‘d first met and then he had ended it.

And he had made sure to make it hurt in the way only someone you‘d let just a little too deep into your heart could. All sharp tongue, cold eyes and cruel, cutting words. Because utterly ruining it was the only way Robert could think of to make sure that Aaron wouldn‘t take him back, no matter how much he begged.

And that was the most crucial part, because Robert had felt like begging and crying and taking every word of it back the moment the first syllable had fallen from his lips. So Aaron being strong enough for the both of them had been the only thing Robert could count on in it all.

It was a good thing that Aaron had always been the strongest person Robert had ever known.

 

\---

 

“Small world, eh?” Aaron was glad for Robert taking charge and finally breaking the awkward silence they had fallen into, even though the smile the older man gave him as he spoke felt forced and foreign.

He nodded, but it wasn‘t enough, the stifling quiet already creeping back into the space between their low breaths. So Aaron opened his mouth, a mumbled “right” the only response he could think of in the moment. Robert didn‘t make an attempt to speak again. Instead, his deep, blue-green eyes were still fixed on Aaron, their warmth starting to send a shiver down Aaron‘s spine that he had been all too accustomed to once upon a time.

It made Aaron drop his gaze. In the spur of the moment, he decided to zero in on the coffee cup in Robert‘s hand, preferring its familiarity over that of his face.

It wasn‘t enough to stop the prickling in its tracks, but it muted it just enough to stop it from spreading all the way down to his toes and right into his fingertips the way it had whenever he‘d felt Robert looking at him like that in the past: All wonder and relief alike, as if Aaron were the answer to a million questions swirling in Robert‘s head that he hadn‘t even known to ask himself before.

Seemingly having caught the younger man staring, Robert put the cup down and shoved his hands down the pockets of his jeans. Aaron saw it as his chance to busy himself and turn his back towards Robert. So he reached for the cup and dumped the remaining drips of coffee from it into the underbar sink, before finding a place for the piece of porcelain in their already stacked to the brim dishwasher. ( Courtesy of Matty, he was certain.)

“Hotten, huh?” he asked, shuffling cups and plates about to find some more room, his voice a little raised so as to drown out the clattering. Small talk had never been Aaron‘s strong suit, but not having to look Robert in the eye as he spoke certainly made things easier.

“Yeah, just passing through,” came the answer, accompanied by the sound of Robert tapping on the wooden countertop in a nervous gesture Aaron remembered all too well from their first few nights out in public; Robert‘s fingertips never not moving along the bar as they waited for their drinks in fear of being found out. “Seeing Diane and Vic for the holidays,” Robert offered with a shrug and Aaron couldn‘t think of another time when the two of them had been so ill at ease with each other.

Not able to put it off any longer, Aaron stood back up and kicked the dishwasher shut with his foot before facing Robert properly once again. The two of them were only nodding at each other, much more resembling the bobblehead figurines Aaron used to relentlessly tease Robert for owning than two people who once had meant the world to each other.

Or at least Robert had to Aaron.

“Bet they‘re excited to see ya,” he tried nonetheless.

Robert only hummed somewhat affirmatively, suddenly miles away.

“Another Americano then?” The question seemed to pull Robert back, their eyes meeting once again before the older man decided to stare at his shoes instead. “Yeah,” he gave his boots a faint smile. “Thanks.”

Neither of them mentioned the fact that Aaron still knew Robert‘s coffee order by heart.

“Sure, I‘ll bring it over in a minute.”

 

\---

 

Robert turned on his heels slowly and skulked back towards his table with his hands deep in his pockets. It wasn‘t enough to stop them from shaking, but at least this way he could be sure that Aaron wouldn‘t notice.

 

\---

 

Aaron took a little longer than usual preparing the order.

Took his time pouring the coffee into the portafilter. Put it in slowly, checking twice that the filter sat just right against the machine. Meticulously cleaned a new cup while he waited for the shot to pour, even though he knew full well that it was already spotless. Tardily filled it with hot water before topping it off with the shot of espresso.

He didn‘t turn around once in all this. Didn‘t look at Robert, but instead only concentrated on this one simple task he‘d performed a hundred times over in the past year, hoping for it to calm his mind like it usually did.

But the way his left hand needed to hold onto his right as he poured the drink so as to steady the stupid little tremor in his fingertips that seeing his ex had conjured up was all the proof Aaron needed that that wouldn‘t work.

Not fully.

Two years of practice at having the image of Robert‘s face and the feeling of his touch blur were all for nothing the minute he stood in front of him again.

It‘s not like Aaron hadn‘t known that there was no erasing Robert, the older man seared into his brain and his subconscious since that afternoon in the bogs of the Leeds convention center. A part of him, really, a little voice in the back of Aaron‘s mind in all the best and worse ways.

But there was knowing it and experiencing it. And Aaron wasn‘t sure if he loved or hated the latter.

He guessed that like most things in life the feeling probably sat somewhere in the space in between.

Once he couldn‘t put it off any longer, Aaron grabbed a chocolate biscuit from the basket sitting next to the till and placed it on the saucer before carrying them over to the corner were Robert was still sitting on his laptop. Aaron had assumed him to be working, but from what he could catch looking over Robert‘s shoulder, he seemed to be staring into the empty street out the window front ahead of him rather than actually getting anything done.

Lost in thought, the older man didn‘t even look up when Aaron reached his table.

So as not to make him jump when he placed the Americano next to him, Aaron cleared his throat to catch his attention. “There ya go,” he muttered, already turning back around towards his workspace.

It was more of a grumble than an actual “ta” he got from his ex in return, but Aaron found himself somewhat grateful for it. Because really, what else was there to say? ( A lot, actually. But Aaron didn‘t know how to. Wasn‘t sure if that would even be a good idea.)

Only Robert had never been one to just leave things be.

“Yours?” he called back.

It made Aaron turn his head towards him once more, brows furrowed in confusion.

“What?” he asked.

“The shop,” Robert clarified, hands gesturing and trying to somehow encapsulate the space around them, “is it yours?”

There was pride shining through the nod Aaron gave him in reply, “Yeah.”

“Aaron Dingle, business owner,” it made a smile tug at the corners of Robert‘s mouth. The first one that looked real to Aaron in the way the old ones always had. One that was all Aaron‘s Robert. “Who‘d have thought, eh?”

Looking down at his boots, Aaron tried for a smile in return, but it came out a little crooked.

The “you did” got stuck in Aaron‘s throat, halfway between his heart and his mouth, in the way so many of their truths always had.

Robert had always been the one to believe in him in that way, listening with open ears and wide eyes in the quietness of a shared bed as Aaron would speak of one day wanting something that was all his. A place he could call his own, unlike everything else in his life. With Robert, all of those dreams that Aaron usually tended to wave off as childish naivité and foolish delusions had suddenly been met with nothing but encouragement and even offers of investing money in whatever venture Aaron would find himself in.

All the while Robert pretended that he didn‘t know that he himself was just another one of those things in Aaron Dingle‘s life that he desperately wanted but that weren‘t his to have.

Aaron had been grateful for both: The support and the wilful ignorance.

“Don‘t make me think I fell for a quitter, Dingle.” That‘s what Robert had whispered into his neck with a grin one night under the covers.

Right after Aaron had once again declined one of his offers, using timing and inexperience as an excuse the way he usually did. Let alone the fact that money had always been the last thing Aaron had wanted from Robert.

But it hadn‘t even matter, because all talk of business had been forgotten seconds later anyway, Robert tucking his slip of the tongue away under warm breaths and nimble fingers and Aaron letting him.

(In a way, it was Robert that had made Aaron buy the shop. Had made him throw all of his fears overboard. Later. After. Once Robert had been gone from Aaron‘s life for good and old encouragements and the unwavering belief in him Aaron had felt back when they had been together had been the only thing of Robert‘s that Aaron still had to hold onto. That small voice in the back of his head that he had let guide him, telling him to just give it a shot, too familiar not to belong to his ex.)

Looking up at Robert now, that crooked smile on Aaron‘s face still not budging, the sadness he could see building behind Robert‘s eyes let Aaron know that he wasn‘t the only one who sometimes thought of those nights when he found himself under the covers alone, hugging a pillow in lieu of what they both were missing.

 

\---

 

Pride.

That‘s what Robert felt looking around the room once Aaron had gotten back to his table on the other side of the counter and Robert could finally breathe again.

He had always wanted something like this for Aaron. Maybe a cozy coffee shop hadn‘t been the first thing he‘d have come up with, but he had always wanted Aaron to have something of his own, knowing full well that after a life lived by other people‘s rules the one thing the younger man had craved more than anything was to be his own boss. To work by his own clock and for his own pocket, nobody else deciding for him. And he had always known that he‘d be more than capable. Saw the strength and determination in those deep blue eyes that others so easily overlooked.

But his encouragements had never been enough.

Still, that didn‘t mean that he was any less proud now.

The shop was simple. Clean lines and warm, dark colours filling the room, giving it a modern look without taking away from its homeliness. Even the Christmas decorations were muted, string lights on the windows, small metal lanterns sitting on each table and the odd ceramic figurine and wreath making the space feel festive without it being overbearing. Robert let his eyes run along the lines of the dark wooden tables and chairs, let them follow the shapes patterned onto the black and white tiles, before he landed on the exposed brick walls where black and white pictures of old race cars somehow matched up perfectly with Yorkshire landscape shots and a pencil drawing of the Eiffel tower. It was Aaron‘s life scattered over the wall in abstract pictures. Like a treasure map only for the eyes of those in the know.

He had no idea who or what it was that had come about to finally make Aaron believe in himself in that way Robert had never managed to, but he was grateful nonetheless.

Next to him, the only other occupants of the shop besides him and Aaron who had spent the last hour or so enveloping the place in a warm background noise of low whispers and shuffling feet as they had played footsie underneath their table, got up and Robert saw the bloke leave some cash next to their emptied cups and plates before the couple pulled their jackets back on and stumbled towards the door, the girl curled into the boyfriend‘s side as they giggled and wrapped themselves around each other a little tighter before confronting the evening cold.

The little bell above the entrance went one last time and then it was suddenly quiet.

Robert had never been comfortable with silence.

To him, silences always reeked of one of two things: failed opportunities or self-reflection.

And as someone who had never been comfortable being left alone with his own thoughts for too long and had been beaten down by life one too many times to let a chance at what he wanted pass him by, Robert couldn‘t stand either.

So he had trained himself to fill silences with noise in any way he could.

With quips and sales lines and cutting remarks that made people see him as charming and confident and self-assured in a way so few out there were and that kept himself just distracted enough from the busyness of his own mind.

Talking, Robert had found, was a way for him to get what he wanted.

Until Aaron had come along.

Aaron who wasn‘t to be swayed by epic prose and spun fairy tales, but by soft touches and actions and kept promises instead.

Two years ago, Robert‘s heart would have happily spent forever silently wrapped up in Aaron. Nose pressed into the crook of his neck, arm thrown over his chest and warm breaths the only sound filling the space around them. If only his head head had let him.

It was a shame that he had wasted so much time forcing his heart to let itself be overruled by his head.

But it was all the more reason for him to stay put now.

Just a little longer.

In this place between where he came from and where he was supposed to be that yet somehow managed to feel just right even in its silence.

Carefully, so as not to draw any attention to himself, Robert turned towards the counter where only Aaron‘s soft curls were visible to him over the countertop as he had buried his head back in what Robert could only assume was paperwork. Knowing Aaron, he probably hated every second of it, but seeing that he was here anyway -  working on numbers and calculations that were probably doing his head in all alone on Christmas Eve - just made that feeling of pride settle even stronger in the pit of Robert‘s stomach.

With a soft smile on his face, he went back to what felt like the hundredth application letter he had sent out in the past few of months with a newfound eagerness, the sounds of Aaron‘s pen running over paper and his own fingers flying over the keyboard of his laptop the only noises to be heard.

 

\---

 

Aaron knew full well that he was dragging his feet now.

The kids had left about half an hour ago, which was more than enough time to clean a table on any other day, but here he was at a quarter to seven -  already fifteen minutes past the shops usual closing hour - still fiddling about with a wet dishcloth. He was running it over the tabletop the third time now, shoveling invisible biscuit crumbs onto the floor in a desperate attempt to prolong the inevitable.

Which was stupid, really.  

It was Christmas Eve and here he was working overtime in his own shop, a half hour drive from the rest of his family and all because he didn‘t want to kick a customer out.

That customer being a man who had broken his heart ten times over and left him a slobbering mess of a human for months. And yet, just having him here, the two of them only existing in the same space, felt so comfortable that he didn‘t want to let go of it.

Even if this wasn‘t getting him - let alone the two of them - anywhere: Both of them simply lingering in the space between everything that had been left unsaid as they waited for one of them to give up and either leave or open their goddamn mouth.

Finally giving up on the imaginary crumbs, Aaron went into the back and got a broom. With his fingernails digging into the wooden stick, he started to sweep the floors at the entrance. He was going to start there and then make his way to the back, slowly but surely, and once he had finished, he would tell Robert that he was closing up and that he had to go.

That was the plan.

He could give himself one sweep of the shop in comfortable silence. One sweep while he indulged in the opportunities of a what-if, before he would have to watch Robert leave yet again.

Rachel, his counselor, would probably have called it an avoidance technique or maybe even self-destructive, but this wasn‘t really a situation to be helped by slowly counting to ten in his head and taking a deep breath. And only five sessions in, he wasn‘t completely certain if those coping mechanisms also applied to things that made him feel genuinely happy, even if only for the moment.

So sod what she had to say.

With memories of Robert playing in his head, Aaron first rounded the table that the young couple had occupied before he made his way along the window front, every sweep bringing him a little closer to where Robert was still sitting. Now and again, he would feel the older man‘s eyes on him. But instead of facing him, Aaron let the feeling of it wash over him like a wave in that way he had used to back when a stolen glance from Robert had been the highlight of his, fearing that them actually sharing a look might break the moment and whatever odd bit of serenity they had managed to carve out for themselves in the ridiculousness of their situation.

That‘s when he heard the little stifled laugh.

“Didn‘t think I‘d ever see you all domestic with a broom in hand.”

It must have slipped out from the way Robert was biting his bottom lip when Aaron turned to him a second later.

In another world, Aaron would have smiled at him then and they‘d have shared a laugh about how Robert used to always complain when Aaron managed to turn any hotel bathroom into a tornado of open gel tins, dirty hoodies and sweaty socks in a single night. He might have even made a quip about Robert needing to get out of bed after even the best of shags just to pick his dress shirts and pants off from the floor where Aaron had thrown them in lust and carefully prop them over a chair to keep them from wrinkling too much.

In another world, this would have been where Aaron and Robert would have started to banter in the way only exes could.

But in this one, Aaron saw Robert bite his lip and the only thing he could see was a hole in the wall in Leeds two years back and Robert doing just that and raising his eyebrows at him in annoyance as Aaron had stood in front of him - all red eyes and quivering chin - and begged him not to go.

In this world, that single image of Robert telling Aaron to just get over himself and realise that they had never been more than an easy fling on the side, one of many, started to tint every other memory of the two of them that had been swirling in Aaron‘s mind dark green and black as he thought about the person Robert had always imagined doing chores with. The person he could see himself sweeping floors and making beds with, fighting about it all until it became a laughing matter.

The person Robert had always been able to imagine a life with, rather than just stolen moments.

The person that had never been Aaron, no matter how badly he had wanted to be.

“How's the wife doing then?”It came out sharp and low, the harshness of it making Robert‘s brows furrow for a second, making him take a deep breath like he was bracing himself. For what, Aaron didn‘t know.

“Divorced now,” came the answer and suddenly the stiffness of Robert‘s shoulders made much more sense.

Aaron huffed at him, Robert‘s words stopping his anger in its tracks and leaving him a little surprised, but desperate not to let it show.

“Guess that‘s what happens when you marry a bird even though you‘re-”

But Robert interrupted him.

“I‘m not gay,” Aaron was about to roll his eyes just like he had that very first night in bed, when Robert had mentioned Chrissie and tried to convince him that he didn‘t actually have an interest in blokes, when Robert spoke up again. “I‘m bisexual.”

It stopped Aaron sweeping.

The words sounded a little foreign from Robert‘s mouth, like his tongue hadn‘t fully gotten used to the shape and flow of them just yet, but there was no underlying shame there anymore. At least it didn‘t sound like it, which was new.

“Oh, right,” it was a flustered stutter. “Sorry about presuming,” he muttered next and meant it.

Robert only nodded sharply with pursed lips.

“And the divorce,” Aaron added.

“Are ya?” Robert asked and Aaron wasn‘t sure, so he just gave a little half-shrug in response.

Both of them let out a breath at that, their shy smiles matching at the sameness of it. Robert‘s eyes were still pinning Aaron down and while he couldn‘t pinpoint what it was exactly that he found in them, he did know what question to ask straight away.

“Are you?” 

At that, Robert‘s eyes fell and Aaron finally gave in. Following the magnetic pull he‘d been feeling since he had first laid eyes on Robert again, he pulled the chair opposite to Robert‘s from the table and leaned his broom against the wall before sitting down to face his ex properly.

Robert tilted his head. “I don‘t know,” he said, still speaking rather to his mostly empty coffee cup than to the man in front of him. Then, after a pause, “Maybe.”

Aaron reached over towards Robert‘s coffee cup, feeling the older man‘s eyes follow his hand as he picked up the wrapper of the chocolate biscuit Robert had long eaten.

“Maybe?” he questioned, starting to fold the silver foil into a tiny hat in the way his step-mum had used to do with paper napkins when she had tried to keep his little sister distracted over dinner. Aaron concentrated on the task at hand, knowing that a bit of silence had always been the best medicine when it came to wanting Robert to open up.

And he did, because there were a pain and worry laced into Robert‘s voice that had replaced the angry bubble that had been building in the pit of his stomach before with concern in an instant.

It took a minute before Robert spoke up again, Aaron already having folded the wrapper three times over. ”Not in the way I should be, I think,” he admitted and Aaron only hummed in response.

“That‘s the first time I‘ve said that out loud,” it stumbled from Robert‘s lips with relief, followed by something that sounded a little like a hollowed laugh, but not quite.

Aaron looked up at him.

“So, what are you sorry for then?” he wondered.

Lost in thought, Robert let the tip of his tongue poke out between his lips, obviously trying to find the right words to pinpoint what he was feeling. “Guess I feel sorry for myself mostly,” he explained and while Aaron had always known Robert to be self-centered and a bit of a narcissist, that didn‘t ring completely true. Not when the corners of his mouth fell the minute he had said it and he got that far away look in his eyes again. But Aaron didn‘t even have a chance to question it before Robert continued. “And for messing you around,” he said and unlike what had come before, it was clear and warm and came with Robert‘s eyes right back on his ex. It felt like a stab to Aaron‘s heart.

“Robert,” he amended, because even with Robert‘s words practically pinning Aaron to his chair with their sincerity, he couldn‘t quite believe them to be true. Didn‘t dare to.  “You don‘t have to-”

“No,” Robert almost stumbled over his tongue at that, that‘s how hastily he pressed it out. “I‘m not just saying that, Aaron. I really am sorry,” it came out low and warm, with a squeeze to Aaron‘s hand that almost felt like a hallucination, considering how quickly Robert pulled away again.

And because it was Robert, Aaron couldn‘t help but notice his heart go warm with it despite the pain that had come before.

He ran his teeth over his bottom lip, his mind suddenly blank but also filled with a million questions and accusations that needed answers, but Robert had already opened his mouth again, seemingly needing to say more.

“You and I, we-” Robert stopped and scrunched up his nose, searching for the right words in a way Aaron had never seen from him before. That‘s when the dishwasher decided to draw attention to itself, the usually so subtle beep announcing the end of its wash cycle suddenly deafening and the most irritating thing either one of them had ever heard with how quiet the shop had been around them before. Robert gave Aaron a lopsided smile. “Saved by the bell, I guess.”

 

\---

 

Robert was glad when Aaron stood up to turn the thing off, because it gave him a minute to get his head back on straight.

He wasn‘t even sure where all of that had come from.

It‘s not that it wasn‘t true.

It was, all of it.

In everything that his divorce had brought with it, Robert had found that he ended up mostly feeling sorry for himself. Not in the way the turn of phrase usually implied though. Not because he felt like he had deserved better. (He hadn‘t, if anything, Chrissie had let him off easy). And sure, sometimes when he found himself alone at night on an uncomfortable mattress in a too tiny flat and unsure of how to pay his next gas bill, he missed the mansion and his job and knowing the code to a safe full of a seemingly never ending supply of money.

But that wasn‘t the point.

Really, he felt sorry because in a matter of stupid, unnecessary risks he had managed to kill the idea of himself he had had in his head since he was just a teenager and had been forced out of his own home. The idea of himself that his father had put there, once he had found himself unhappy with the reality of what his son had turned out to be. 

He felt sorry for once again proving himself a failure on that front.

But more importantly, he felt sorry for having tried to live up to it for so long at all. For having made himself miserable with it. For having turned into a version of himself he could barely stand in it all.

Only you couldn‘t really put that in a single sentence, because there wasn‘t a neatly packaged way to explain fifteen years of turmoil in a desperate attempt to please a ghost to someone who had gotten hurt in the process.

But just now with Aaron sitting in front of him, dangling on that edge between anger and warmth in that way that had fascinated Robert since the day they had met, Aaron had made him want to try. Seeing Aaron in front of him with his head down and suddenly finding himself staring at the slope of his neck where it dropped into his broad shoulders - almost able to smell his musky aftershave and feel the scratch of his beard against his cheek, if he only tried hard enough - had made Robert want to try. Had made him think of how he used to bury his nose right in that space and just let truths spill out of him, because Aaron had felt safe and like home and because he‘d known that Aaron wouldn‘t run just from seeing all the edges Robert spent most of his life so desperately trying to hide.

Aaron had always made Robert want to try, in more ways than one.

But mostly now, because if nothing else he had always deserved so much better than the lies Robert had fed him the night he had ended it all.

Right then, snapping Robert out of the thought spiral he had started to dig himself into, Aaron chose to sit back down in front of him, eyes wide and fingers fidgeting. “I´m sorry too, ya know,” he said, looking up at Robert through thick lashes.

Robert swallowed hard. It wasn‘t what he had expected.

All the times he had imagined this scenario in his head, in all the nights he had spent trying to come up with an apology that would suffice and reciting it in his own head to himself as if getting it right might be enough to lessen the guilt he was feeling, he had never expected an apology. Anger and insults and tears and once or twice, when he was feeling especially broken, a hint of forgiveness. But never an apology. 

“What do you have to be sorry for?” It was the only response Robert could think of. 

“I kept on pushing when I know I shouldn‘t have.” At that Aaron let out a long slow breath. “Wanting to force you out the closet, like I didn‘t know full well what-” Aaron was clearly struggling now, nose turning red and eyes threatening to water.

“Aaron,” a low whispered thing.

Of course Robert remembered.

They had been fine in the beginning, both of them convinced that they were nothing but a means to an end. Sex to scratch an itch, but never anything more. Until creeping feelings had started to blur the lines and suddenly just planning for the next weekend hadn‘t been enough anymore. First it was next month, then it was next summer and before either of them knew it they had been building a future, only it was one parallel to the one that Robert had already mapped out for himself.

And all of a sudden that hadn‘t felt like enough anymore.

It had been in the days between Christmas and New Year, when time stops feeling real and people have a tendency to lose themselves somewhere between booze, too much food and the unshakable feeling of love and family hanging in the air that Aaron had asked him for the first time. Chrissie had taken her son to see his father, so him and Aaron had been slumped on the sofa at Robert‘s place in just their pants, Rocky playing on the TV and when Robert had told him that that might just be the best holiday he‘d ever had, Aaron had just gone and said it:

"Guess ya could just leave your wife, then we‘d have this everyday."

He‘d just thrown it out, all casual and with a stupid grin on his face while Robert's head was in his lap and their fingers were twisted around each other in the most domestic way. But neither one of them had been stupid enough to believe that it was actually a joke.

Robert had practically run right after. Had cut their weekend short under the cover of a business meeting that Aaron knew full well was made up. But that didn‘t take the words back and so they had kept sliding into conversation from there on out, in one way or another. Growing more and more genuine as Aaron‘s feeling grew right with them.

It had graded on Robert, like someone picking on a scraped-over wound, but he hadn‘t held it against Aaron.

Not really.

At least not towards the end, when Robert had sometimes felt that maybe just one more word from Aaron might have been enough for him to be able to allow himself that sort of an indulgence. Because that‘s what the idea of actually being with Aaron, building a life with him, had felt like back then: A luxury, a break from the norm, a weakness one could only allow oneself on special occasions.

Only Robert Sugden had never liked people to see him weak.

“No,” Aaron interjected a little harsher now, trying to push emotions to the side for a minute and compose himself. Wanting - needing - Robert to understand that he meant it. “I‘m serious. Maybe if I hadn‘t, we-”

But Robert chimed in, never having been good at watching Aaron suffer even after having been the cause for it so often.

“Remember those old Westerns I used to try and get you into?” he asked and the way Aaron scrunched up his nose in annoyance at having been interrupted yet again almost made Robert grin in its adorableness. It also made him appreciate Aaron indulging his tangent even more than he usually would have. 

“You mean you trying to force black and white films on me like it‘s the 1950s?” A small smile played on his lips upon the memory. “Yeah,” Aaron nodded. “I remember.”

“You know how for those films, they never actually built all those fancy saloons, but just the facades? So it looked all nice and put together on film but there was actually a whole different thing going on behind them?” Robert‘s hands where moving wildly now, gesturing lines and shapes in hopes to get his point across. “It‘s like that was my life and then you and I got it on against the bins in the back, bumped against a wall and knocked the whole thing right over,” the corner of his mouth tugged upwards at the ridiculousness of his own metaphor then. “And suddenly there I was, standing out in the open with my pants round my ankles and still all I wanted was you. And it petrified me. So much so, that building all the houses back up and pretending it hadn‘t even happened seemed a whole lot easier than to just pull my pants back up and go home with you without a care what everyone else might think.” The small smile on his lips had fallen as quickly as it had come, Robert suddenly worrying that that might have been one of those images that would only ever make sense in his own head. Let alone the fact that he felt exposed, his fears now suddenly out on the table for Aaron to see and judge and do with as he pleased.

But Aaron only huffed a low, warm laugh that actually managed to reach his reddening eyes. “Like I would have sex with you against some dirty bins,” he snarked.

And just like that the knot that had been threatening to build in the pit of Robert‘s stomach loosened up again. He didn‘t miss a beat. “Like you wouldn‘t,” he challenged.

For a moment, the two of them just smiled each other, Robert enjoying the moment too much to gloat about the fact that Aaron hadn‘t objected.

Still, he felt the need to explain himself. Properly.

“What I mean is that back then I just couldn‘t deal with us. With what it all meant,” he let his head tilt to the side and watched Aaron carefully. “ I didn‘t want to either. Just needed to figure it out on my own time, right?” He looked over for reassurance and found it right in Aaron‘s kind blue eyes.

“Right,” Aaron swiped at his nose with the back of his hand.

“Nothing you could have done about it,” Robert reminded him and hoped that Aaron would really hear him.

Aaron let out a little sniffle as he nodded, always much more prone to tears than the man sat opposite him, before a spark returned to his eyes. “Bit of an extensive metaphor though, mate,” he teased, one of his brows pulled up high.

“Sorry,” Robert mumbled under his breath and couldn‘t stop a bit of red from spreading over his cheeks. “Being divorced and unemployed gives you too much time to watch TV.”

Aaron‘s smile grew a little softer at that. “I get it though,” he amended.

Robert‘s eyes went wide and gleaming with hope. “You do?” he wondered and the earnestness of it all made his cheeks blush properly.

“Yeah,” Aaron nodded,  “I think I really do.” 

And Robert thought of a night spend in the back of his Porsche. Remembered stories of Aaron falling for his best friend and kicking and screaming and fighting the world in hopes of not having to be who he was and it made him believe that Aaron meant it.

 

**Author's Note:**

> written for this year‘s [secret santa](http://robronsecretsanta.tumblr.com/). find me on tumblr [@vicbartons](https://vicbartons.tumblr.com/).


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